Nose of Wine (1)

Despite working till 12 - 1am lately, I really wanna motivate myself by writing at least 2 posts a week... here comes, the nose buds:

The beginners (like me) normally would ask questions like:
" The label says it has apricot, lemon and hint of vanilla...I smell nothing! or I could only say, I smell WINE!"

In fact, there are tools to help you understand the description of wine, help you express your feeling and share your joy with others.

Tool 1: Aroma Kit (Le Nez Du Vin -- Wine Nose)
This is so far the most direct way of introducing the taste to newcomers of wine world.
In each of the little bottle, they are generally presented in the form of wax so that the smell can be captured and long lasting.
They are the extract of the materials ranging from fruit to spice to wood to gas to provide us with a wide range of vials of aromas in wine.
Sometimes you may identify commonality in wine which consists of same grape varietal and this would be exceptionally helpful to those learners which memorize things based on smell.
A typical aroma kit has 36-54 essence, and the kit costs HKD$3000up.

Anyone can buy me one of these as birthday present??? I am happy to blow him / her a kiss, with a warm hug :)

Small talk on Terrior

People always draw conclusions that the quality of wine is determined by -- Terroir.
True, majority I agree is from Terrior. When I learn that from a book, the critical point is that uncertainty is quite complex; multi Terrior related factors in guaranteeing a good wine.

Rainfall, soil, sunshine...they are all determined by God. For example, grapes gained most of the sunlight when they are planted on 45 degree slope, good irrigation, retainability of water in soil is crucial in affecting the vines growth etc. No wonder Wine is called "Dew of God".

Amongst all factors, the one which is so "inborn" and "destiny" one is the altitude of the vineyard. Even it is within the same village, or even the same chateau, the Terroir may not be the same, which gives the variety and the uncertainty to wine, even in Chateauneuf - du - Pape, you might bought the wine next to the cuvee one and got disappointed. (hope it doesn't offend anyone :P)

Those in temperate zone like France will benefit from its geographical advantages. Thus Australia and Chile earn the same benefit. From the atlas, you can tell, the upcoming one is...China.

The one with most branding now is "The Great Wall". I am looking forward to how much people would invest in China to supply more funds in the investigation of the potential in wine development in there. Should be something interesting ^^

My first wine cellar

12 x Vintec Wine Cellar finally arrives~~~with 4 Hugel & Fils white wine :)

After unwrapping it, I try to put it in my window pane...oh yea, it's real.

It's stuffy, it's hot, but that's the only perfect place to make my room a bit...customized, a bit...myself.

The first thing I do is...open my dad's cellar, retrieve all my wines and store that into my new cellar. Here it comes! shxx! The size only accomodates red wine, the v.v. traditional red wine bottle size, they don't fit the white wine bottles at all @.@

So I ended up stored all my red wine and petit red & white into the cellar~ And place my Stitch puzzle above the cellar.

My first wine cellar.

Alsace Wine Fair

Alsace Wine Fair

29 Aug 12:30 - 5:00 pm

Star Room 42/F, Langham Place Hotel Mongkok

With more than 23 fine wine stores displaying their Alsace exclusive wine for wine tastings, I myself is only one of the small drunkard wandering around for great wines.

Age range from 21 to 60, French, portugese, hongkongese...all are attracted by gorgeous riesling, gewurztraminer, pinot gris, pinot blanc, muscat...wowwww~~

Thanks for my fds recommending me to such a nice tasting event~

White wine used to be female's favourite, no wonder most guys are companying their girlfriends. Foccasia, brie cheese, celery, carrots and cucumber which fills the guests' lunch even though drunkard like me challenge the wine with empty tummy can still stay "sober" for a while.

I used to love Riesling's pear and green apple flavour. In this wine event, most riesling are covered with plastic cock smell (though France normally adopts oak cock, that's weird),

Gewurztraminer's peach flavour is surprisingly giving me a wide exposure of how grapes can be that revoluntionary. Tried at least 16 shops' gewurztraminer, some are crystalized like dessert wine because of late harvesting, some are aromatic in smell yet light and crispy in body, some are typical peach with mineral hint of palate. You can't imagine they are from the same origin with same characteristics.

I ended up bought Hugel & Fils VT Gewurztraminer 2002 & Albert Mann Gewurztraminer 2007, with free Vintec 12 bottle wine cabinet yey~~~

Upcoming wine gatherings - Wine tasting buddy wanted!!!~

Wine tasting can be of many forms, here are the menu of my proposed upcoming wine gatherings:

@ Horizontal Tasting: Tasting a series of wine on the same grape combination, can sole grape tasting or blended grape tasting.
@Vertical Tasting: Tasting same wine by of different vintages.
@Area / Terrior Tasting: Tasting of the similar wine region or wine environment of similar geographic condition
@Flavour Tasting: Tasting wine of similar flavour e.g. vanilla, butter, peach, oak...
@Vintage Tasting: Tasting various wine of same vintage
@Sole drinking vs food matching: self-explanatory
@Sole tasting vs blend tasting: find the best match grape combo
@Palate tasting vs Nose tasting: How different between your first smell and your first taste of the same glass.

Wine Tasting Buddy needed. Please sign-up and I'll get the venue and wine list ready. That would be one of my mission in 2009~~~

時光機 time machine

想起叮噹...必定想起時光機...

如果你可以坐上時光機，在人生之中可以選擇在某一個點上重新來過，你會選擇在哪一點?

這幾天我都在問身邊的朋友這個random 問題，他們卻反應非常凝重，可想而知我真的很無聊...但他們卻不是...

有些朋友答中學六年級，有些答小學五年級，大部份答大學，而原因都圍繞著兩個: 玩得太少或讀得不夠。

這反映著甚麼? 反映著他們所選擇的點必是人生的轉捩點，又或是一些後悔的決定。

這一點亦決定了他們的priority of life, 事業，家庭，愛情，生活?

你的選擇是...?

Old photos

In love with Gaspard & Lisa series, recently bought new photo albums in the shop nearby and it's time to rearrange the photos I have had since 10 years old, when my dad gave me a camera as birthday present.

Flipping through photos, across different time horizon...remarkable memories that I have had with friends. Some that I still chat with, some I don't, some in Hong Kong, some in US/ UK...

I miss them all, I would like to reconnect with them, so I decided...to send them each a facebook message tonight, to recollect our linkage...our memories, our relationships that I cherish...